kbobam

Exactly!

LOL at "...what use is it?" On another note, all my appliances 'fell off the back of a truck'. Am I the only one who knows their 'true' worth? As opposed to all the shmucks (of course I'm kidding) who buy them at big-box stores?

Thanks, Craig! I was kind of embarrassed at one point when I bought the water bottle. Wrote the seller asking him if he could reduce the expensive shipping charge. He wrote back something like "I guess I could, but why would I?" It was only then I realized I was thinking in terms of Coke or 7up bottles. You'd need quite a few of them to equal the weight of this sucker. Another topic if it's okay. Only recently figured out that there really is a Duffy, Ohio in the States. So now I'm paying a little more attention to people's locations. Having looked up Fremantle, I have a 'can' question for you. Are you familiar with this stuff? The can isn't part of a collection. I've just kept it for many years because I thought it was the best beer I'd ever tasted and haven't seen it since. But one time it appeared in the background of a photo I posted, and people wrote back off-topic asking why I would drink "that swill". Which is putting it a little more nicely than they did. Don't know if you're a beer-person, but wondering if you have an opinion. (And forgive me if I'm being an idiot for ass-uming that you must be familiar with it since you're on the same continent!) Bob

Huh! Is there a lemonade ashtray? That would be really nice, but I wouldn't think it would be more expensive than the others you have. Maybe having a well-known 'name' pumps it up. For what it's worth, my personal opinion (which my lawyer informs me I must tell you might be completely wrong) is that the really 'outrageous' Akro pieces you're collecting are probably the closest thing to an 'investment' that you're going to find in the marble and similar world. They seem to pretty much bring top dollar consistently, and with the economy as it is, I'd say keep buying them if you're getting reasonable deals. Pretty sure you'll at least stay ahead of inflation. And if you're enjoying the heck out of it, you're that much more ahead of the game. So if you have any family members or friends who think you're nuts, like most of us have, just tell them that Bob said it was okay!

Too much!

The username doesn't have a lot to it. Way back when I needed a name for something or other and came up with the imaginary radio station WBOBFM. At some point there were some problems with an account which wouldn't let me reinstate with this name, so I recreated myself as KBOBAM, the west-coast version. Here are some bottle pictures. Some of the pictures of bottles in carriers aren't quite accurate, which is to say the bottles might be older than the carrier or vice-versa. I go back and forth on being a stickler for accuracy or just doing what I think looks good in the photo. The seltzer water bottle is kind of neat as a Depression-era item, since it shows one company's label painted over another's. Those big heavy bottles weren't cheap, so you got them wherever you could. The picture of the marble on the 7up bottle shows that original carrier I thought was so cool. Also my favorite 7up marble. And if you look at the cap in a sideways upside-down way, you'll see the word 'lithiated'. Most people don't know that 7up has a 'drug-related' background, just like Coca-Cola. Up until 1950 you can see lithium in the ingredients on the label as well. The two bottles of coke are in a contraption that the Coca-Cola folks added onto grocery carts to entice you to pause and refresh while shopping. The last picture includes a pair of 7up dice. All fives on one of them and twos on the other! ( :

Hey Paul, do you think the glass in the new oxblood tray is the same as is in either the milky or silver oxblood marbles? I'm asking because I've always thought the ultimate way to display the ashtrays would be to have one or more marbles of identical glass in them. I have no idea how often non-marble pieces have a corresponding marble, but it would be pretty interesting to find out.

"..the greatest glass artist the Netherlands has ever known.." This guy seems to have a pretty good reputation! ( : Thanks for bringing up the name. I wasn't familiar. http://www.nationaalglasmuseum.nl/english/exhibitions-archive/407-copier-a-new-life

Another Paul with terrific non-marble glass! If I'm remembering correctly, I'm guessing the larger image on the right and the oxblood at the bottom are your new additions. The overall layout of this photo showing all of these pieces at once is spectacular! Winnie's piece is wonderful, and if you told me it was Akro I certainly wouldn't doubt it. It has the slightly more complicated 'dreamy' look that most Akro glass has. (Said with my very limited knowledge.) But it looks to me like "The Jeeperman Collection" is going to mostly consist of the graphically outrageous 'in your face' show-stoppers. Very impressive! The newer one on the right is kind of a combination of the two styles. Is Lindeboom the name used by a particular maker in Leerdam? I tried looking it up and only came up with a beer by that name. Which reminded me that I once tried a beer called Oranjeboom, and it was so good that I kept drinking them until I started seeing colors similar to those in the ashtray.

So that's a 'yes' on the both dig-digging and enjoy-digging? Thanks for all the information. This is interesting stuff! And I honestly didn't expect to especially like the canning jars, but while looking at that impressive collection in the last photo I suddenly 'got' it. Although it made me a little nervous in a bull in a china shop kind of way. If I was actually there I'd be standing way back. The other individual items are great too. I've never dug anything. Although I'm 54, there's no doubt in my mind that I'd be just as thrilled as Alex must have been to discover that bottle. The sequence to my small collections of stuff went like this: 1. Saw a metal six-pack carrier for 7up on the bay one day. Went nuts. I'd never seen anything like it. Not even sure if I'd ever bought anything on-line before. Possibly a few practical things, but nothing like this. 2. Some time later had the brilliant realization that these soda carriers I liked would be even neater with bottles in them! (I can be a little slow at times.) 3. Searching for bottles, I stumbled upon the existence of a 7up marble. Of course I had to have one. This is when all heck started to break loose. 4. Eventually figured out that the people who made the Akro marbles which were some of my favorites also made other stuff! I'm pretty exhausted tonight, and constantly fighting a bad habit of talking too much, so let me get back to you soon with some photos and more rambling. Thanks for sharing your background! Bob

With apologies to any Pauls out there who aren't "idigjars". Sorry to suddenly pick on you, but I've been wondering about a few things for a while now and no one else has asked about them. You seem like a particularly nice person, so you probably won't mind. What are these jars you 'dig'? Would you post some photos here, or direct us to where you do? Are you literally dig-digging them or dig-enjoying them, or both? I guess all our friends here like marbles in one way or another. It would be interesting to hear what their other interests are. Right now I'm mostly thinking about things which are somewhat related. Like jars, or bottles in my case. Although in the 'Laid-back Lounge' I'm sure any category would be welcome. We've had some non-marble Akro Agate posts in the past, although it's been a while. Let's bring these things back! ( :

At the risk of over-doing a theme, once again here's that new lingo I didn't know about, from an unexpected source. ( :

Was just signing out for the night and saw this. I'm seeing the little thumbnail pictures, but they're not going anywhere for me either.

Thanks. There're just too many things going on these days that people accept blindly. They need to be questioned. Still loving the new holiday avatar! It'll be hard to find a replacement for that one! (But if anyone can do it......)

Just saw what I thought was a particularly well-done ad from Bank of America. Here's a close-up of what appeared at the end of it. (Scroll down for a link to the full commercial and final comments.) I'm kind of blown away by this. Although I halfway understand all the fine print we see everywhere, (or don't see because it's made to go by too quickly), this situation really makes me wonder just how screwed-up things are in general. What's implied here? That Bank of America is concerned that they could possibly be sued by the government? Here's a 'tuber' link to the commercial. What do you think? Seems to me that most people at the DOD or other agencies would be more likely to be angered by the fine print legalese implication that they might not like this ad! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QJFRy8DHRwA

I'm not always big on this sort of stuff, but this one's definitely kick-butt cute and funny!

I didn't stick around to see the rest of this commercial. Have to assume it's for a product that's supposedly good for your dog's (an "other critter" in this case) teeth. This image is kind of horrifying to me. It makes me completely understand why some people can't deal with clowns. I can handle those, although I'm not especially fond of them. You know what freaks me out even more than this canine? Those kids' show locomotives that have faces. They scare the h-e double matchsticks out of me, and I have no idea why. ( :

Wishing you a 'WoW!' day!

It's a nice color combo! If it turns out there's no proper established name for this one, I'd personally want to call it a 'Ruby Dragon'. Kind of in the same way the transparent red defines a Ruby Bee.

It's gotta be hard to do the polite chuckle over and over again. And a late 'Happy Birthday!' (I think?)

In today's freeze-frames we're dealing with generalized marble references, rather than actual marble images. But I think they continue to prove my point that marbles are in everyone's brain somewhere! From two obviously 'family' shows, although not quite G-rated, 'The Millers' and 'The Goldbergs'.

One of my favorite things to finally 'not care' about is 'what people think'. At least as far as worrying about embarrassing myself. I can't even begin to count all the times I've wanted to do different things but held myself back for fear of making a fool of myself. What a waste. And the really silly thing is that most times people respect you for not being afraid to do something 'different'! I'm remembering the time I brought a 'Muddy' to a construction site where I was working. Figured there was no finer mud anywhere to use as a background for what would hopefully be a great marble photo. Sure, I attracted a little attention kneeling in the dirt and carefully positioning my Pelt. But all the guys who called me "Mud-Man" after that always did so in a fraternal 'high-five' kind of way. Like they appreciated my showing them that they weren't the only ones going insane from the daily grind.

You know, I wasn't even paying attention to the size. That's definitely some icing on the cake! (I'm guessing Rich is going to be waiting a long time for that PM)

WOL This was an actual "Whoa!" out loud for me. Really stunning! ( :